


Reconciliation

by randomcheeses



Series: Family [2]
Category: Fullmetal Alchemist
Genre: Alternate Timeline, Drama, Family, Gen, Gen Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-08-18
Updated: 2010-08-18
Packaged: 2017-10-11 03:44:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/107978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/randomcheeses/pseuds/randomcheeses
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Izumi's brother realises she doesn't need a circle to transmute.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Reconciliation

“You’re still here?” Izumi asked in surprise as Roy staggered into her back yard while she was weeding a small flower bed. “I would’ve thought you’d be on your way to the train station by now. After all, didn’t your military superiors expect you to report back, oh, about two weeks ago?” she said, a bright smile on her face.

Roy did not smile back. “I saw you transmute,” he stated evenly.

“And?” Izumi said distractedly, turning back to the flower bed.

“You don’t use circles.”

There was hiss of indrawn breath and Roy’s sister stiffened. “What’s your point?” she snapped.

“My point,” Roy replied slowly, “is that when you are forced to spend three weeks alone with someone, you tend to get to know them a lot better, and apart from learning to spot when he was surreptitiously trying to feed me rat meat, I happened to notice that Edward seems to repeatedly suffer from a very specific set of nightmares.”

“Is this going anywhere?” Izumi asked icily. “Or are you just talking to hear the sound of your own voice again?”

 “Turns out that some people tend to talk a bit more freely if they find themselves crying in your arms after screaming themselves awake for the third time,” Roy told her, ignoring Izumi’s sarcasm.  “Edward happened to mention that only someone who sees a particular sight can transmute without circles. And that there is only one way that someone could see that particular sight.”

Izumi’s back had gone rigid and she would not turn to face him. “Ed would be furious if he knew that you were telling someone you’d seen him cry,” she hissed.

“I wouldn’t dream of telling this to anyone else,” Roy replied. “Saying it to you is different, and you know it.”

“Roy, what is it that you want? For me to join your precious military, is that it?”

“What I _want_ is an explanation as to why my older sister would do something so reckless and foolish!” Roy said angrily. “What were you thinking?!”

“I don’t remember being obliged to explain myself to you, dog of the military,” Izumi snapped. She rose and began to walk into the house, her back still turned towards Roy. “I suggest you leave.”

Roy grabbed his sister’s arm in frustration, halting her in her tracks. “Izumi, who was it?” he demanded. “Who could have been so important that you’d risk your life to bring them back? You know how dangerous human transmutation is, why it’s forbidden. So why did you do it?”

Izumi glared poisonously at him and tried to pull away. Roy’s shoulder felt as if it was being wrenched out of it’s socket, but he held on tight to Izumi’s wrist. He wasn’t going to let his sister shake him off and send him away with a scolding. Not this time.

“Who was it?” he asked her again as she twisted his arm back. “Argh! You’ve got Sig, Mom’s fine, so am I and the rest of the girls. So why did you do it?”

“Because I wanted my _son_ back!”

Roy’s grip slackened in shock. “What?” he whispered, as Izumi pulled her wrist free.

“I wanted my son back,” Izumi repeated, and to Roy’s horror, he saw tears began to trickle down his sister’s face.

“Your . . . son?” Roy stammered. “You had a child?”

Izumi nodded, pain in her eyes. “It was a couple of years before I met Ed and Al,” she began. “When we found out I was expecting, it was like a dream come true. At first, everything was fine. I went to the doctor regularly, he would tell me that I was doing well and to remember to eat lots of fresh fruit and vegetables, things like that. But in my sixth month. . .” She trailed off.

Roy reached out and took his sister’s hand. “What happened then?” he asked gently, ushering her towards a low wall to sit down.

“Something went wrong,” Izumi said quietly. “I started to feel ill for days at a time and ended up spending the next three months in bed. I couldn’t keep anything down and I lost so much weight. My body. . . it could no longer sustain my child. I went into labour three weeks early and . . .” She stopped and gulped, trying to hold back tears.

“He died at birth,” Roy finished for her.

But Izumi shook her head. “No,” she whispered bitterly. “Before birth. My son died inside me and I was so, so _angry,_ Roy. It just wasn’t fair! He never even got the chance to have a life at all. I couldn’t see him as being dead. All I could think of was that it must have been some kind of mistake, that I had to correct it. And when the transmutation went wrong I paid for my foolishness.”

“Your illness,” Roy guessed.

Izumi nodded. “Though it’s not really an illness. It’s an internal wound. I tried to bring a child back to life and in return the Gate made sure I could never have another.”

Her brother could only stare, horrified. “Sister . . .”

She tried to smile. “It’s probably for the best isn’t it? The closest I’ve had to living sons in my life are Ed and Al, and look what happened to them. I didn’t warn them, didn’t teach them or protect them well enough.”

Tears had begun to run down Izumi’s face in an unstoppable flow. “Who knows the kind of mess,” she coughed, “that I would’ve made in the life of a child actually related to-”

Roy cut her off, his hand suddenly covering over her mouth. “Stop,” he begged, hugging her close. “Just stop. That isn’t true and you know it!”

“I-”

“You would make a great mother,” Roy whispered in his sister’s ear. “Don’t ever think any different. Not ever.”

Sig Curtis watched from the doorway as his wife embraced her brother for the first time in years. Perhaps Izumi would feel a little better from now on, he thought.


End file.
